£10m for NHS in Wales after worst ever figures

The NHS in Wales is to get an extra £10 million after the worst ever waiting times in accident and emergency, with the Welsh Ambulance Service reporting a 23 per cent rise in red calls, compared to last winter.

December NHS figures for Wales showed that only 72.1 per cent of patients waited less than four hours in A&E to be treated, transferred or discharged, compared to the target of 95 per cent. This was lower than the previous month, as well as December 2018 (77.8 per cent).

Furthermore, there were 6,656 patients waiting more than 12 hours - a record high - and the Welsh Ambulance Service failed to meet its target for responding to immediately life threatening calls for the second time since the target was introduced in 2015.

Regarding the rise in red calls, the ambulance service responded to 62 per cent of red calls within eight minutes in December (the target is 65 per cent), with there also a recorded 8.4 per cent increase in amber calls over the same period. The Welsh Ambulance Service received more than 100 red calls on eight out of these 17 days, peaking at 119 calls on 20 December.

The funding is in addition to the £30 million worth of funds announced in the Autumn.

Health Minister Vaughan Gething said: “We want Health Boards to work with partners to improve the flow of patients through the hospital system and out into the community, and I have made an extra £10 million available to support improvement in this area. The ambulance service faced significant pressure, with average daily ‘red calls’ increasing to the highest on record and exceeding 100 for the first time. We are disappointed the target was not achieved although more patients in the red category received a response within the target time than last December.

“Demand on emergency departments is also affecting the delivery of planned treatments at hospitals. This is being made worse by doctors reducing their hours because of changes to HMRC pension tax rules by the UK government. By the end of December, this had led to about 3,200 sessions lost, affecting nearly 27,000 patients. I have called on the UK government to resolve this matter urgently. Our hard-working, dedicated NHS staff have been working tirelessly throughout the year and it is clear demand is only set to grow. For that reason we need to transform the way we deliver health and social care in the future. As well as the short-term measures I have announced today, we are investing £100 million through our Transformation Fund to develop new models of care, to create a sustainable health and social care for the future.”